Joe the Pressman: The Incredible True Story of an Enslaved African Boy who Became a Heroic Freedom Fighter
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Paperback: $17.99 USD
Hardcover: $28.99 USD
Long ago, a young African boy was stolen from his family and forced onto a slave ship, sailing far from his homeland. Joe the Pressman is an illustrated children’s book that recounts the remarkable true story of his forced migration to the Caribbean and then to Philadelphia, where he was enslaved by printer William Dunlap. His journey led him to Quebec City, where he was forced to work for William Brown and Thomas Gilmore, co-founders of the Quebec Gazette. Renamed Joe, he became the pressman, the shop’s most valued laborer. However, Joe’s memories of freedom fueled his determination to escape the bonds of slavery. He successfully fled five times, three in the harsh Quebec winters, which compelled his enslavers to publish fugitive slave ads in their attempts to recapture him.
Joe’s defiance highlights his intelligence and bravery, and it is through his struggles that we learn about his life. This book not only honors Joe’s legendary spirit but also educates young readers about the lesser-known histories of slavery in cold climate regions like the US North and Canada. Unlike many children’s books that focus on plantation slavery in the US South, Joe the Pressman is the first English-language children’s book to delve into the 200-year history of Canadian Slavery. Through Joe’s inspiring story, readers gain insight into the past while being encouraged to confront injustice and embrace their own strength.
Praise for “Joe the Pressman”:
In Joe the Pressman, Charmaine Nelson offers a powerful intervention into both the history of enslavement in Canada and the stories we tell young readers about freedom and belonging. Moving deftly from broad historical framing to an intimate microhistorical portrait, Nelson challenges the enduring myth of Canada as an uncomplicated promised land while recovering the lived experiences of enslaved Black people in the eighteenth-century North.
Particularly striking is her innovative use of fugitive slave advertisements — documents intended to mark Black subjects as property but which, in Nelson’s careful reading, instead reveal Joe’s determination, literacy, mobility, and overall humanity. The result is a work that not only exposes the racial logics that structured early Canadian society but also models for young readers how historical recovery can push back against biographical erasure.
At once accessible and deeply researched, Joe the Pressman demonstrates that children’s literature can do serious historical work, inviting readers of all ages to reconsider what they think they know about enslavement, resistance, and the contested meanings of freedom in the North.
-Tyran Steward, PhD, Assistant Professor of History, Williams College, Williamstown, MA, USA
Cite this Book: Charmaine A. Nelson, Joe the Pressman: The Incredible True Story of an Enslaved African Boy who became a Heroic Freedom Fighter (Amherst, MA: Black Maple Magazine Publishing, 2026)
Hear Charmaine discuss Joe the Pressman on CBC Mainstreet NS with Jeff Douglas (July 22, 2025)